Rain!

It's raining! And today is the fourth day! My children are getting buggy from needing to stay inside all the time!! It started raining on Sunday afternoon, and has rained off and on ever since... There's tropical weather systems in the area, so we have times of lots of wind, and it's really neat to hear the rain pounding on the windows... We're probably going on 3" of rain since Sunday. And it's cold... just the kind of weather that makes you feel like curling up with a blanket and a book...

Taking the Wind Turbine down...

Several weeks ago, I noticed that the wind turbine wasn't charging the batteries anymore... A call to the company revealed that there was probably a short up there somewhere, and that we would need to bring the tower down to find out what's going on and fix it... It's a 60' tower and not the easiest thing to do... It hasn't been down since we put it up 2 1/2 years ago... We all breathed a big sigh of relief when it was down safely... Here's pictures of the process... In the background you can see the white truck...that truck is the all important part of getting it on the ground safely. The tower was connected to it by cable, and we were able to bring it down by slowly driving forward...

Adjusting the top tension wires....

Coming down...

A little further....

... and further...

...almost down...

On the ground!!!!

Now comes the troubleshooting part...

... but we have enough guys to figure it out...

They discovered that it was the rectifier that was shorted, so the turbine will be out of commission for a few more weeks until we are able to get the part and put it back in service...

Degaje!

We were amused to see this moto drive by our house the other day with the wheelbarrow coming on behind!!

Sunday Evening with friends...

Last Sunday evening we spent the evening with our friends, Steve & Shana Simmons... They brought Pastor C.J. along like they often do and Pastor Dinion's 18-year old son from Labiche, "Ded". We had a nice time of singing and fellowship...

Did you ever see two people playing one guitar???

Pastor C.J. and "Ded"...

Steve playing the keyboard while "Ded" accompanies on the guitar.

And finally Weston with his friend, Pastor C.J. - C.J. loves children and takes a special interest in Weston, because he saw how tiny Weston was when he came...

Shelling Beans...

Rose was shelling beans one evening and Elaine wanted to help... It was a good excuse to stay out of bed a little longer, but she stuck at it!!!! :)

Tremors!

We were waking up slowly to another beautiful day in Haiti on Monday morning, when suddenly with a rumble the house started to shake and some of the children screamed... another tremor! We all relaxed pretty quick afterward, and went on with our day... Dad's came, and we headed to bed fairly late after welcoming them... We were in bed, when we felt a jolt and then it shook for real... The children must have been sound asleep 'cause they only stirred in their sleep, but I grabbed Weston out of his bed, and we kind of froze, not sure what to do whether it was going to be bad or just another semi-small one... Everything in my room was shaking and I wasn't sure if the bookcase was going to stay standing or not... Later we found out that it was a magnitude 4.4 and that the epicenter was only a tenth of a degree to the north and west of us... That's why it felt so strong to us... It made me pretty tense for a while, but after an hour or so I was able to relax and go to sleep... some of my neighbors ran and people screamed... It'll be a LONG time before we forget what it was like to go through that Jan 12, 2010 earthquake... Just a few minutes ago, I felt another small tremor...

Our Charming Li'l Fellow...

Weston weighs over 12 lbs now and is going on 12 weeks... He is such a little sunshine! The smiles and coos are more and more frequent... He definitely saves the most for his mommy, and "Auntie Lor"...

He's not one to let the grass grow under his feet and will soon be sitting by the looks of things...

He's just so much fun... So alive when you talk to him... Pastor Sujet (CJ) just loves him, and it seems like Weston loves him in return. Last night CJ was here with the missionaries from Allegre and I wished that I could've gotten a picture of CJ holding Weston on the sofa and they both were sleeping...

Weston definitely has his own opinions about life... The other morning I was hanging out laundry and they called out to tell me that Weston was just crying and didn't want to be quiet. I was almost done, so I said I'd be in soon. I came in to find him quiet because Loretta was holding him, and as soon as I took him he nestled down and went right to sleep... He makes us laugh so many times. I don't know if it's just been so long since I had a baby here that makes me enjoy him so much more or what, but we all are just enjoying every minute of it...

He sleeps well at night only waking up once if that... Most often I can count on him sleeping from around 9 or 10 pm to 5 or 6 in the morning without waking up...

Rose

Last week we spend the weekend in T-Goave with friends... I love this picture that we took of Rose in the Caribbean. It was the first time for her to be in the water like that and she just loved it! It was good to have some time for rest and relaxation and I think we all made a lot of good memories on that trip...

Rainy Day Activities...

The children love playing legos...

Jonathan, Janelle, & Elaine

Cherlise

Jared

Michael is helping Loretta bake...

Mixing cookies.

Rose working on her math...

Weston - 9 weeks old

The power of prayer...

 Yesterday I had the privilege of meeting an old friend, Mme Mejule, whom I hadn't seen for 4 years... We used to be almost neighbors when we both lived in Allegre... It was so nice to get caught up on our lives of the past 4 years... She has 7 living children and is expecting her 8th. Her husband was not a Christian while they lived in Allegre even though he would make professions from time to time... He wasn't always faithful to his wife, and could be hard to get along with sometimes... She told me how she would pray earnestly that God would give her, in Mejule, the kind of Christian man and leader that she needed. Mejule would hear her praying sometimes and it would make him so angry! He would say, "You want me to die, so that you can have another husband?!" But she kept on praying and God answered those prayers... Mejule gave his life to the Lord and now thanks God for a wife that cared enough for his soul to pray for him like that!!! It is so exciting to her to finally be able to serve the Lord together with her husband!